FIRING BACK

What the media don't want me to say

Do you want to know how the media work? Or, more accurately, don’t work?

When asked to comment about my instantly infamous “legitimate rape” comment in my new book “Firing Back,” I describe what Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney should have said: “A credibly accused rapist is giving the keynote speech at the Democratic convention in two weeks, and you want me to denounce a decent, God-fearing man for his inelegant comments about rape? No, not happening, and if the truth hurts, put some ice on it.”

Although Politico reporters Anna Palmer and Tarini Parti had a copy of my book to work from for their July 10 article, “Todd Akin returns to national stage,” they censored the text to read, “[Bill Clinton] is giving the keynote speech at the Democratic convention in two weeks. …”

In removing the phrase “a credibly accused rapist,” they not only stripped the logic from the quote – what, the reader must wonder, does the “ice” have to do with anything? – but they also denied legitimacy to at least one solid rape accusation against Clinton.

As I explain in the book, rape is a horrible crime. I have zero sympathy for those who commit it. For this reason, had I been in Congress in 1998, I would have voted with my colleagues to impeach President Bill Clinton.

I am sure there are young people reading this right now wondering what kind of connection I am going to make, but please bear with me. I take no joy in telling this story, but it is essential if we are to understand how Democrats and the media exploit the good manners and courtesy of Republicans.

Known in government documents as “Jane Doe No. 5,” Juanita Broaddrick made a highly credible claim under oath that Bill Clinton raped her when he was attorney general of the state of Arkansas.

“It was a real panicky, panicky situation,” Broaddrick would tell Lisa Myers on NBC’s “Dateline” in February 1999. “I was even to the point where I was getting very noisy, you know, yelling to ‘Please stop.’ And that’s when he pressed down on my right shoulder and he would bite my lip.”

On the way out of the room, when Clinton saw her swollen lip, he famously said, “Put some ice on that.” It was Broaddrick’s testimony under oath in the Paula Jones investigation that persuaded a few key congressmen to proceed with impeachment proceedings against Clinton.

Nor was Broaddrick the only woman to accuse Clinton of sexual assault, sexual indecency or even of biting her lip to coerce sex. His gross misbehavior with Paula Jones led to the lawsuit that exposed his indecent White House carousing with an intern, Monica Lewinsky.

All of this was in my book. What I don’t mention, but the Politico reporters must know about, was Clinton’s brutal groping of Kathleen Willey, which was covered in depth on “60 Minutes.”

What they should know as well was what Newsweek’s Michael Isikoff wrote in his book, “Uncovering Clinton: A Reporter’s Story,” about how Clinton, then Arkansas governor, had sex with former Miss America Elizabeth Ward Gracen.

“It was rough sex,” Isikoff wrote, “Clinton got so carried away that he bit her lip, Gracen later told friends. But it was consensual.”

Isikoff missed the lip-biting connection. He also failed to acknowledge that at least one of Gracen’s friends, Judy Stokes, had told the Paula Jones legal team that the sex was not consensual at all.

Hillary Clinton’s role in all of this was to manage what the Clinton camp called “bimbo eruptions” and denounce women like Lewinsky and former Clinton girlfriend Gennifer Flowers as liars. According to Broaddrick, Hillary even made a veiled threat to her after the rape occurred.

The Politico reporters chose not to know any of this. They insisted that Clinton’s “impeachment involved Lewinsky, not sexual assault.” This long-standing evasion of the rape accusations against Clinton have allowed him to regain his popularity and allowed Hillary to perpetuate the Democratic nonsense about the so-called “Republican War on Women.”

The bottom line is that my career was ruined for my linking the words “legitimate and rape.” The Clintons, meanwhile, have maintained their careers only because the media have consciously delegitimized the rape and assault charges against Bill Clinton. And don’t get me started on Hillary’s jokey radio interview in which she took credit for springing a man she knew to be guilty of raping a 12-year-old girl.